For I Love You As My Soul
by Malteaser
Summary: Alice and Hatter are getting married. Mazel Tov! O Frabjous Day!


It had gotten to the point where Alice was seriously considering running away and eloping at sea. Captains could still perform marriage ceremonies, right?

"Maybe we should just get married in Wonderland," she groaned.

"You're kidding right?" Hatter said, regarding the catering menus as though they might suddenly attack. "This is bad. A Wonderland wedding would be a thousand times worse."

Alice laughed. "Try me."

"Okay, so, first of all, it's your wedding, so the entire planet would want to come," Hatter began. "Following that, at the bare minimum, it'd have to last three days to be legally binding."

"Three days?" Alice asked incredulously.

"Three days. The first day, we have to build this kind of arch out of pine needles, while everyone and their brother comes by to throw their wedding gifts at it, which is why it takes the whole day. The second day, we start the actual wedding, until our mutual friends kidnap me and hide me somewhere. After you find me, there's a gigantic party. On the third day, when everyone's too tired and hung-over to do anything else, we go through the actual ceremony. We stand under the arch, we get someone high up in Wonderland to explain to everyone why we're better together than not, and then our families and/or family stand-ins tie our hands together with ribbons, and thus we are wed."

Alice stared. "And you thought breaking a glass was strange."

"It _is_ strange!" Hatter cried. "Who wants broken glass at a wedding?"

Alice rolled her eyes.

"And I'm not smashing cake in your face either," Hatter continued. "It'll ruin your dress, it's rude, and it's a waste of cake."

"No arguments here," Alice agreed. She'd never liked that particular tradition anyway.

She was beginning to wonder, though, with the guilty feeling that comes with late realizations, what sort of traditions Hatter liked.

"Would you like a Wonderland wedding?"

"Did you not here a word I just said?" Hatter asked. "Three days!"

"Yes, well, you never actually said what you thought about it," Alice pointed out. Sure, he'd implied that it was more trouble than it was worth, but she'd noticed that Hatter had a very Spock-like tendency to use implication as a form of misdirection. Or, as humans called it, lying.

"I think the arch might get in the way of the canopy," Hatter remarked after a beat.

"We can do both," Alice pointed out. "One here, one in Wonderland."

"We don't have to-"

"This is your wedding too, you can have input."

"I am giving input! Notice the large pile of rejected catering and wedding venues in the recycling!"

"Hatter," Alice said firmly. "Would you like a Wonderland wedding, yes or no?"

"Not the whole shebang, no," Hatter said, after a long silence. "I wouldn't want a wedding in Wonderland, and I don't really fancy being kidnapped, even for fun."

He took the hat from his head and began to twirl it contemplatively. "I mean, this is where we're building our life together. You have the family who's worried about their culture disappearing. I'm not marrying you to get gifts chucked at me, or to start a ribbon collection; I'm marrying you because I love you, and I'll always love you and I want everyone to know it."

It was really unfair of him to say things that made her want to propose all over again when they were on the verge of a much-needed argument.

"Now that that's sorted," Hatter said cheerfully, flipping his hat back on now that he was sure she'd been distracted. "Let's figure out what everyone's eating at this thing."

_

* * *

_

Do you, David, take Alice to be your wife, promising to cherish and protect her, whether in good fortune or adversity…

One broken glass, several dances, a buffet, and a close encounter with the rabbi later, and Hatter had the first of several sudden realizations that he was a married man. He was Alice's husband. Alice was his wife.

It didn't matter how he phrased it, it sounded wonderful.

"What?" Alice asked, grinning.

Hatter, on the other hand, had on a full-blown Cheshire smile. "We're married!"

"Canopy, canapés, and all," Alice agreed, her grin widening.

Hatter bent down to kiss his wife again. Alice reached up to tangle a hand in his hair.

"Now all we have to do is get through the rest of the reception, and then it's off to the honeymoon," Hatter murmured when they parted, Alice still playing with the hairs on the back of his neck.

"Not quite," Alice told him.

"No?" Hatter asked, frowning. "What am I forgetting?"

He'd put the ring on Alice's finger, smashed the glass, kissed the bride (he'd have done that even if it was a normal day) danced with Carol, danced with Alice's Nana, danced with Charlie (the old man had insisted), talked with Dormie for a while, managed to be pleasant with Jack, despite only inviting him to make visiting Wonderland go smoothly…

"Just give me one minute to get everybody ready," Alice said, slipping away, leaving him to dance with bewilderment for a while.

But only a very short while; soon she was back, taking her hand in his and leading him over the where Charlie stood in his whitest tunic.

"Just Alice, Hatter," he said, in a tone that would have been officious if it hadn't been so warm. "I look forward to meeting my godchildren."

And with that, he tied a white silk ribbon around their joined hands.

"Oh," Hatter said, a bit blindsided.

Charlie moved away, and Dormie took his place. "I expect you to name one of those kids after me," he said, adding a dark green ribbon. "Consider it payment for my babysitting services."

"I expect you to keep looking after her," Jack added. His ribbon was a dark red, of course. "Though I doubt it needs saying."

"That goes both ways." Duchess' ribbon was gold.

"I still don't believe you're from Yorkshire," Alice's Grandfather said, tying his black ribbon on with hands shaking with age. "But I'm not sure if that matters at this point."

He had no idea what her Nana said, but he like the fact that her ribbon had ducks printed on it made him feel more inclined to think that it was complimentary.

"I still can't believe you manage to find one that would hold on long enough to marry you." Jenny was one of Alice's friends from the dojo, so he assumed the words were aimed at her more than him. Her ribbon was a very, very bright pink. "I'm happy you did, though."

Carol was last, of course. Her ribbon was the same color blue as the dress Alice had worn when they first met. "I know you'll both be very happy together. Welcome to the family."

"Thank you," Hatter replied dazedly.

"I know you said you weren't marrying me for the ribbon collection, but I figured it wouldn't hurt," Alice whispered into his ear.

"Nope," Hatter replied, looking down at their joined hands. "You never know when you might need ribbon."

_I'm married_, he thought, just before he had to kiss his wife again. _I'm actually, really married._

**

* * *

**

A/N: The Wonderland ceremony Alice and Hatter actually participate in is a variant of handfasting, a ceremony that predates ring exchange, and is still practiced in several places in Europe, as well as part of Wiccan and neo-pagan weddings. Traditionally, people in Scandinavia were married beneath arches made of pine boughs, though the couple aren't required to build said arch. The idea of people throwing gifts comes from the many traditions found all over the world where people throw everything from rice to gold coins at the newlyweds. There are also a fair number of cultures which kidnap the bride as part of the celebration, so I decided to gender flip it for Wonderland.

**Without the slightest bit of canonical evidence, my Alice has decided that she's Jewish, and I've decided to run with it. The quotes in italics are the start of Reform vows; the title of this piece is taken from more traditional ones. There's some contention about what smashing the glass means. Some hold that it symbolizes the destruction of the second temple, and the need to remember suffering even in your happiest moments. Others hold that it symbolizes how long the couple's love will last: as long as the glass is broken, or forever. **

**And… long author's note are long. I hope you enjoyed what is perhaps the fluffiest thing I've ever written.**


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